Fly Away Dream Keeper

    Has anyone ever told you that it wasn’t your fault when something went wrong? Well that is not what I’ve been taught. I, Melinda Finch, am going to tell you about how one group out of everyone I know will hurt you in ways that really suck to people who will love you and make you happy just because they want to.
  “Hurry up! We will miss the train if you don’t hurry!” screamed Katie Lynn.
  “I’m coming!” I yelled back.
  “I guess this is the goodbye that you said would never come.” Jay Wyatt said softly with a small tint of sadness in his eyes.
    Jay Wyatt was the boy of the summer for me; I had said things to him that I wished I could say to my family and friends. He made me feel special and happy in my own way. We had fallen in love and now was the time for departure, if only I could have one last day. Jay was tall, rough around the edges but had the eyes that made my heart soar; it was like looking into the dark blue of the ocean that never stopped being beautiful.
    “I will always have a place in my heart for you. I love you Jay Wyatt!” I said as I took off with tears filling my eyes.
    On the train ride home all I could do was think about Jay and going back to a place that seemed so foreign yet it was home. Katie Lynn and I had stepped of the train in St. Louis, Missouri to find my other best friend with open arms. We drove about two hours till we came upon the familiar shape of the West Coast Academy. The man standing outside the gate was the one and only General Michael Finch, my father.
    “I’m home and I wish to go back. I can’t face the drama anymore” I said to Katie as we walked up to my dad.
  “Too Late, Jay can’t be apart of you anymore, or of course you can tell Ricky about your new romance back in New York.” Katie said.
    Katie isn’t the type who likes it when she doesn’t have a guy who loves her back. In my case it would be two guys. Ricky began to walk toward her when all the sudden a new kid walked up and whispered in her ear.
    “Jay won’t give you up, not until he finds out about the Ricky guy who doesn’t love you like Jay does.”
      “What?” I was shocked at the rasp in his voice. “Who are you?”
    “My name is Danny. Jay’s brother and I know something about Ricky that you don’t know.” After that, I was freaked, but thank god he walked away.
    “Welcome home. I need to talk to you, Now.” said Ricky in a rushed panicky voice.
    Well I have to admit it wasn’t what I expected to hear from the guy who asked me for my hand in marriage two months before.
    “Okay, I’m all yours.” I said as he dragged me off to the other side to the building. “What’s up Ricky?”
    “I can’t live life knowing that our marriage would be over if you’d ever find out.” He stood there fidgeting and sweat rolled down the face that seemed so perfect when you would wake up next to it in the morning. He was avoiding all signs of eye contact and then it hit me. Something was wrong.
    “What is it? What’s wrong?” At first I thought that maybe he somehow found out about Jay, and then what happened next was the most painful experience ever.
Katie Lynn walked over. “What Happened?”
    “Forgive me Melinda. I have to forget my promise to you. I’m am to marry Katie Lynn next Thursday, and in six months our first child shall be born.” He couldn’t look at me but I knew he was serious.
      “You brought me home to tell me that you’re to have a kid in six months because you slept with my fiancé in the two months I was away.”
Ricky knew it wasn’t pointed toward him so he stayed silent. Then Katie Lynn spoke up.
    “Yes and I am sorry if your angry but now you have no say in this matter because you yourself have cheated on him with Jay.”
    “But I didn’t go far enough to take any effect like the one you have brought upon yourself. Take back every detail in your life that had me in it. You are not to speak to me again. Congratulations and good luck on your forbidden path you have taken. No longer will I speak to either of you.” I started to tear up as I walked away. I couldn’t take it they betrayed me and what made my day was the fact the she of all people told me that Jay couldn’t be apart of my life anymore. Would he ever take me back, knowing that I technically cheated on both of them just like my back-stabbing, supposable, best friend?
      When I walked back to where my dad was standing he looked pale.
      “He told you? Good. It would not be right if you didn’t know.”
      “You knew? How could you bring me back just to add to the pain in my life?” I could not believe it, my own father there to watch me hurt while being told that the one person in my entire life that seemed to know how I felt about Ricky and Jay was now dead to me. “I’m not living here; I’m going to live with mom in Denver. Right now you all disgust me.”
      “I will have you escorted to your mothers.” My father said trying to make eye contact.
      “No you won’t. I’m seventeen years old and I’m taking a vehicle of my choice.” I said in the sternest voice I could manage.
      “Fine so be it. Just remember I will leave a spot at this academy for you and a guest to visit or live.” After he said that I decided that I should pick my car and leave. Of course he had already had the key for the lime green hummer with black leather interior, except for the fact that it was Ricky’s ‘borrowed car’ from my father last year. I had some good memories in it.

    When I reached my mothers after the drive from Newton, Iowa to Denver, Colorado I walked inside to find my older sister talking to my mom in the kitchen. My brother-in-law, his friend, and of course my dear old friend Eddie was watching ‘Perfect Pair’ on Fuse in the parlor. I walked into the kitchen and my mom and sister got up, walked toward me and wrapped their arms around me. I started to cry yet again.
    “Your already set to go to school whenever your ready, sweetie.” My mom said in a lower tone than usual. “I see that you’ve gotten a new vehicle, do you remember the way to school?”
    “Yes, I’m ready to go back tomorrow morning.” I replied.

      The next morning I drove to school, and realized that it didn’t change from the last time I had seen it. People I knew were of course there and I spoke to the Dean in which he gave me my schedule. The first thing I noticed in every one of my classes there just happened to be the one and only Jay Wyatt, looking nice like always. He noticed me and we spoke for the first time in several days.
         “What are you doing here?” I asked with a smirk on my face.
         “Same thing as you, learning of course.” He smiled then it vanished off his face. “So I hear that, uh, you recently broke it off with some fiancé of yours that got your friend pregnant.”
         “Oh, well I meant to tell you this summer about him, but you were the type of person that I would do anything for, just to meet you.” I said with the thought that he would not want to speak again with me.
         “So it’s over for you and him?” he asked.
         “Yes, it’s over. And if you’d take me back then I would be the happiest person of everyone on earth.” I said with the biggest smile that I have had on in a long time.
         “Then let it be said, wait, When did we ever break up?” replied Jay with the biggest grin on his face. “There is only one problem.”
         “What problem?” I asked.
         “The problem of, I’m guessing, your ex- boyfriend standing in the doorway with an evil glare toward me.” He said in a serious voice.
         “What!” So I turned around to find him with a really angry look about him and he points his finger in a way that I knew he wanted to talk, so I ignored him and assuming Jay would let me, I kissed him for a few seconds and Ricky grabbed my arm and literally threw me out the door, screaming that its over and I was going home. After a few words were thrown I went back into the classroom and talked to Jay saying that I loved him and that Ricky is a jerk that needs a life.
         Our senior year was flying by and I was happy because I still had Jay. You see I had invited him over for dinner tonight because my mother just needs to meet him. I mean come on wouldn’t you?
         Later that night after dinner, we went into the parlor for some drinks. After it was my eighteenth birthday. And you would not believe what happened next. Katie Lynn showed at my door saying how sorry she was and how Ricky broke up with her so she had no other place to go.
         “That’s what you get for back-stabbing your best friend. Oh, yea, and saying that Jay had no place in my life anymore.” I said with an evil grin. “But I’m not the type to dismiss an old friend.” So I open the door and of course she sees Jay. She stood all awkward and humiliated so she decided to leave moments later with no explanation.
         The next thing you know a year passes and I, Melinda Finch, became Mrs. Wyatt. We had married in New York, with his family in the pews of St. Josephine’s Church with, as Jay likes to call it, god as a witness to our miracle.
I was so happy by the time we had our first born, we named her Claudia Elizabeth after her great-grandma that passed just a few months before. Claudia Elizabeth Wyatt was able to grow up in a wonderful family with a brother named Michael Donora Wyatt. They both grew up and led in a very successful business of writing stories for young and old generations. ,            We have bought every book they have written together and solely, but we don’t need them because they come back and visit their dear old parents in South Dakota where we relax in our home in the mountains.
    I must tell you that as they grew older I taught them the one secret I had from my grandma.
    This is what she said:
         “There is a dream in every living soul, and there has to be a way to give them to a safe keeper right?” I would yes to her and she’d go “That means tonight when you dream, dream big and when you wake up say ‘Fly away Dream Keeper’ and that dream will be safe.”

    My kids became fond of that story so instead of just hanging up the phone, we would say:
                        “Fly away Dream Keeper”
    We’d say this so that the dreams and wishes we thought and said in that conversation, would be kept safe. I now get tears I n my eyes every time my kid says that to me before we hang up the phone.